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Sense – Wake up when it's right for you

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Re: Sense – Wake up when it's right for you

#51

Post by sosborn »

contingencies wrote: post #16
philbarr wrote: post #3

What affects my sleep isn't me setting my alarm for the wrong time, it's my 13 week old baby. I'm sure I've seen a few things like this in the past. I wonder if they could adopt it for use as a baby monitor? We do currently have a sleep monitor but that just sets off an alarm if she hasn't moved in 20 seconds (or I pick her up and forget to turn the damn thing off, grrrr). I could see this being a really useful baby…

Haha, 3 weeks here! I feel your pain. Work output on complex abstract thinking tasks has descended to terrible. It's not just the sleep, either. It's constant interruption when you do get going...

With my first child it was the constant background stress of "Oh my God I don't know what I am doing" that really threw me off. The second one was so much easier!

Re: Sense – Wake up when it's right for you

#52

Post by YZF »

philbarr wrote: post #3

What affects my sleep isn't me setting my alarm for the wrong time, it's my 13 week old baby. I'm sure I've seen a few things like this in the past. I wonder if they could adopt it for use as a baby monitor? We do currently have a sleep monitor but that just sets off an alarm if she hasn't moved in 20 seconds (or I pick her up and forget to turn the damn thing off, grrrr). I could see this being a really useful baby…

Babies need to eat/nurse frequently. We've evolved to be highly dependent on our parents until a fairly old age. The solution that worked for us was for the baby to sleep in our bed next to mom. Then this whole wake/nurse cycles basically happens without fully waking up. I realize some people are concerned about rolling on the baby but this is extremely rare/improbable for normal/healthy people. It's a somewhat controversial topic but do your own research... As a dad that had to go to work I also took some breaks and slept in another room (mom would also sleep during the day when the baby was sleeping). YMMV. Good luck and enjoy!

Re: Sense – Wake up when it's right for you

#53

Post by ernopp »

macNchz wrote: post #35
system_32 wrote: post #11

Why do they need a kickstarter? They have the money for an entire team and are hiring more.

That was my first thought. Crunchbase shows they raised $10.5m at the end of January(1). Now they need $100k of crowdfunding to build this thing? Disingenuous at best. [1] http://www.crunchbase.com/organization/hello-inc

the kickstarter is surely to find & take orders from an audience for the soft launch

Re: Sense – Wake up when it's right for you

#54

Post by bnejad »

mlent wrote: post #22
bnejad wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm confused about your alarm. Why does it go off when your baby has stopped moving(=asleep)? Is that a sign of something bad happening?

If it's sensitive enough to detect breathing as movement, then it would make sense for the alarm to go off if there's absolutely no movement, yes?

Right on, similar to what I was thinking but I'm curious if that's actually feasible.

Re: Sense – Wake up when it's right for you

#55

Post by borgchick »

donpdonp wrote: post #45
dmazin wrote: post #15

How is this different/better than Zeo?

Thanks for mentioning the Zeo. I used it for a month a few years ago. It was ahead of its time using 1-wire EEG monitoring. I felt the REM graph was actually telling me something. Any sleep monitor to try and take its place must be EEG based. An accelerometer is inadequate for sleep monitoring. The closest thing I know of is the OpenBCI.com project (Brain-Computer Interface) which is entirely an EEG project.

I loved the idea of the Zeo, but as comfortable as the headband was, I never did manage to fall asleep with it on. I guess I am just super sensitive to things on my head while in bed. I ended up using the Zeo as a toy to do interesting BCI hacks with.

Re: Sense – Wake up when it's right for you

#56

Post by david_shaw »

From the landing page:

>>> We all have a natural sleep cycle, but a normal alarm will wake you regardless. Sense’s Smart Alarm, knows the right time to wake you, so you will feel alert and refreshed.

This is the part I like best. I wrote a web application (http://sleepyti.me) designed to let people calculate their own "optimized bed times" based on when they need to get up -- in other words, doing what Sense claims to do, but in reverse. The problem, of course, is that if your dog starts barking in the middle of the night, waking you up for an hour -- or if your sleep cycle lengths are significantly different from the norm -- then the app won't work.

It's interesting to me, both because of the consistent traffic to sleepyti.me and the vast array of sleep apps and products, how neglected a good night's rest seems to be. I'm not sure if it's a cultural phenomenon or just a change in human sleep behavior, but everyone I know seems to be in a constant sleep deficit.

If you look at products like Sense, FitBit, Beddit, Sleep Cycle (app), Sleepyti.me, etc, you'll notice that the market is supporting basic human function in those that aren't generally ill. I think it's indicative of a more serious problem that we -- especially in science and technology related fields -- can't seem to make ourselves go to bed.

All of these hacks are great, and the metrics can be very useful... but in the end, nothing beats getting eight hours of sleep per night. Try it for a week or two; the difference might astound you.

Re: Sense – Wake up when it's right for you

#57

Post by desireco42 »

aaronem wrote: post #47
frio wrote: post #33

I grabbed a Beddit ( http://www.beddit.com/ ) off Indiegogo, which does something similar. Compared to Fitbit (put something on; remember to start it), apps (remember to start it) and others, I was hoping it would be frictionless -- hop into bed, start collecting metrics. Unfortunately, aside from the long (long) time required to deliver a useful Android app, it's failed me in a few ways. 1. You need the app running…

My Basis band addresses your point 1 quite well; all I have to do is wear it to bed. Unfortunately, there's no good API (and your choice of three variously lousy ones [1]), and it syncs in the same way as the Beddit does, i.e., via Bluetooth to a phone. (Or via USB to a computer, but that's not much more help.) I've thought about trying to MITM the data on its way out from the PC to Basis's sync endpoint, in order to…

So I was looking for Basis to maybe release next version of their device, then they got acquired by Intel and I was hoping it will not die horrible death, yet from your description this is what is happening.

I am using Fitbit and Basis is what I really need. I think by next year we will have something along the lines that Basis promised.

Re: Sense – Wake up when it's right for you

#58

Post by colmvp »

njharman wrote: post #48

The body works amazingly well when taken care of and listened too. Really. Instead of hyper tracking every aspect of your life [and making assumptions based on that data] Just exercise, eat well, no caffeine, minimal sugar/food after dark, get 10+min of sun around noon, go to sleep when tired. All of which is almost impossible for 90% of people who are forced into regimented, high stress, excessive work lives.

I love the taste of coffee and tea, both of which have caffeine.

Curious, why 10+ minutes of sun at noon?

Re: Sense – Wake up when it's right for you

#60

Post by mynameisvlad »

DougWebb wrote: post #5

So, a WiFi-attached device sitting in my bedroom with a high-sensitivity microphone, a proximity detector, and unknown software? I think I'll pass, even though the product seems cool and useful otherwise. Sure, I've got my cellphone in my bedroom at night and it's got the mic, network connection, and unknown software. But I figure there's a much better chance of someone discovering that Google or Sprint has installed…

This is completely ridiculous. Nobody is going to be building a backdoor into a product only a handful of people use when there are products that millions of people use that are just as easy to backdoor.

If the NSA, CIA, a foreign government, competitors, your own company, your mother, etc. wanted to listen to you and other people en masse, they're going to be backdooring a piece of software which is used by more people. A niche product like this wouldn't warrant the time necessary to bacdoor/collect data.

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